The blue wall

by Richard Washburn Child

His words seemed to clear away the chance of any extraordinary abnormal situation beyond the wall.

“What is the mystery?” he asked nervously.

I can hear the querulous tone of his voice now; I can see the tapestry that hangs above the table in their hall.

“Thank you,” I said, without answering. And so I left him.

Outside, I stopped a moment to look up at that house next door.

It was October tenth. I remember the date well. The good moon was shining, for it has the decency to bathe with its light these cities we make as well as God’s fields. It lit up the front of the residence so that I could see that, perhaps of all in the block, the Estabrooks’ was the plainest, the most modest, with its sobriety of architecture and simplicity, and on the whole the most respectable of all. It seemed to insure tranquillity, refinement, and peace to its owner. I tell you that at that moment, with my chauffeur coughing his hints behind me, I felt almost ashamed for the fancies that had led me to find a mystery behind its stones and mortar.

And then, as suddenly as I speak, I realized that a window on the second floor was being opened gently. I saw two hands rest for a moment on the sill, some small object was dropped into the grass below, and my ears were shocked by a low cry of suffering with which few of the millions which I have heard could be compared!

It is always so, I find. We are ever forced by pure reason away from those delicate subconscious whisperings. I had sensed something beyond the wall, and as science, after all, is not so much truth as a search for truth, I would perhaps have done well to have retained an open mind. Instead, I had sneered at the whole idea. And to rebuke me the house, as if it were itself a personality, had for a fleeting second disclosed the presence of some hidden secret. The window was closed, and then I stood upon the deserted thoroughfare, the hum of my fretting limousine behind me, staring up at the moonlit front of the Estabrooks’ home. You may be sure that it was with a mind full of speculations that I left the spot, asking myself as MacMechem had asked himself, what was behind the wall, what was the thing which was determining the question of the life or death of so lovable a child as little Virginia Marbury....

It is already raining. As I write again, the slap of it on the window makes one feel the possibilities of loneliness in city life....

It is hard for me to describe what a fascination there is in campaigning against death in those special extraordinary cases where the doctor becomes something more than a man of science and is also a man of affections. It is impossible to describe the irritation of being unable to act in cases like Virginia’s—cases where the fight is made between strength of body and mind, on the one hand, and some deep-seated infection, like meningitis, on the other. I was more than anxious for the late afternoon hour when I could again go to the child. Her blue eyes, as deep and mysterious as the sea, called to me, if I may use that word. And there was something else that called to me as well—the blue wall—blank blue wall beyond the bed.